


Against All Odds

by Sundial_at_Night



Series: Another Name [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: And Gets One, Angst, Avenger Loki (Marvel), BAMF Loki (Marvel), BAMF Thor (Marvel), Brothers, Canon-Typical Violence, Fix-It, Gen, Implied/Referenced Mind Control, Implied/Referenced Torture, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Loki (Marvel) Lives, Loki (Marvel) is a Good Bro, Loki (Marvel)-centric, Magic, No Slash, No Smut, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Protective Thor (Marvel), Protectiveness, Redemption, Thor (Marvel) Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 09:41:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24348934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sundial_at_Night/pseuds/Sundial_at_Night
Summary: “So, he’s here?” Thor allowed the lightning to flow through him into the ground, evaporating the nearby Outriders. They didn’t even have the chance to scream. “Where?”“I’m here.”Or: Bruce doesn’t just bring back those killed in the Snap; he brings back everyone killed by Thanos, including a certain Trickster god. Loki has a chance to fix his mistakes, get revenge, and see his brother again during the final battle of Endgame.
Relationships: Loki & Stephen Strange, Loki & Thor (Marvel)
Series: Another Name [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1739896
Comments: 9
Kudos: 428





	Against All Odds

**Author's Note:**

> I’m pretty sure this part hated me the whole time I was writing. I can’t tell how many times I restarted. Anyway, this time I finally get back to Loki. This part can be read as a stand-alone; the other parts aren’t required. Apologies in advance for any spelling/grammar problems. Enjoy!

“Avengers, _assemble.”_

Battle cries rang out through the air that was tinted with dust and debris from the Compound’s collapse, Thor’s among them, but nearly indistinguishable from the others. The two armies charged one another, meeting in a cacophony of chaos at the heart of the battlefield. They were evenly matched, Thor thought, with the Chitauri, the Outriders, and Thanos’ goons on one side, and the Avengers, the Guardians, Wakanda, Asgard, and many others on theirs. Better yet, Thanos did not yet hold the Gauntlet, meaning they still had a chance.

Thor laughed as he fought, slaying Outriders and Chitauri alike with lightning, with Stormbreaker, with his _bare fists_ when the need arose. Side by side with Rogers, he fought in sync with the man worthy of Mjölnir, naturally falling into a rhythm that the Captain had years to develop, and Thor, _centuries._ It felt _good._

Thanos would pay for everything he had done. To Asgard, to the Avengers, to _Loki._ The Titan would _pay._

He called Mjölnir to his hand, the hammer’s familiar song echoing in his ears as it channelled the lightning in his veins and forged it into a weapon of destruction. The storm answered his call, and dark clouds converged above the Thunderer, threatening rain and blasts of electricity. The sky cracked open with a loud _snap_ on each strike of lightning, overwhelming the area with the scent of ozone. Mjölnir was a comforting, familiar weight in his palm, balanced, heavy, though not overwhelmingly so. But where was…

“No, no,” he said to Rogers, pointing to his axe. “Give me that. You have the little one.” The two switched weapons with no objections on the Captain’s part. Thor was about to take off when a welcomed familiar voice sounded behind him through the smoke-filled air.

“My king.” _Heimdall._

It stopped the Thunderer in his tracks, and he turned around as the rabbit and the Captain’s long-haired friend covered his back for a moment. “My friend!” he greeted, a wide smile stretching across his face. It was the first that reached his eyes in years. “It is so good to see you alive!”

Heimdall grinned as well, then admitted, “I did not expect to return from Valhalla.” The Gatekeeper drew his sword, Hofund, and removed the head of a Chitauri foot-soldier to his left. 

“Well,” said Thor, clapping him on the shoulder firmly, “I am glad you did. We have the chance to avenge your deaths.” The battle raged around them, but Thor thought they could spare a moment— _one moment_ —while he greeted his friend.

“The Valkyrie explained what happened. We were not among the Vanished. Why—”

“You were murdered by Thanos,” Thor interrupted, withdrawing his hand. “We brought back all those whom he killed, not only those in the Snap.”

A loud swooping sound came from overhead and Thor raised Stormbreaker, only to see Val on her Pegasus—Aragorn—glide down to a graceful landing beside them, Dragonfang in hand. “Fight now, talk later?” she suggested dryly, but Thor could see the smirk tracing her lips at the sight of a familiar face.

He laughed in response and nodded heartily. Less than a second later, he returned to the battle with Heimdall at his side and the Valkyrie covering them from above. The Gatekeeper’s wounds from the _Statesman_ were healed, and he seemed to have regained his energy. On the same train of thought, Thor asked, voice carefully casual, “Have you seen my brother?”

“Yes,” answered Heimdall simply. “Before we came here.” Hofund fell again, slicing an Outrider in two.

Thor blinked. He had not expected it to work; the Infinity Stones took half of life in the universe. It made sense that they would only be able to return the life they had taken and no more, but here was his friend. _Here._ Right next to him, fighting, and very much _alive._

Thor had offered to put on the Gauntlet and snap his fingers. If he had the chance to bring his people back, he would take it. Thanos slaughtered half on his people _twice;_ once on the _Statesman,_ then again with the Snap. Damn the Titan and his warped sense of justice. Within the span of less than a _month,_ Asgard’s population had been decimated _thrice._ That was not balanced; that was _cruelty._

So, when it became clear that Banner would be the one to bring everyone back, he had pleaded on behalf of his people—on behalf of his brother and his best friend—to bring them back as well. Thanos had killed them during his quest for balance, it was not too much of a stretch to request that they be returned with the others.

 _I’ll do what I can for your people, Thor,_ Banner had agreed. _But the radiation’s mostly gamma. It’s like… uh… it’s like I was made for this._

And so, Bruce had snapped his fingers, enduring the agonizing power of the gauntlet for some time before bringing everyone back. Unsure if Asgard was revived—unsure if the Snap even _worked_ —Thor did not have the time to ask after them before the room _exploded._

“Can you see him?” Thor asked hesitantly, already anticipating the response.

Heimdall glanced over at him, an unreadable expression on his face. His head turned in rapid movements before he replied, “I cannot. But you know how he is.” Loki had ever been able to hide from Heimdall’s sight due to a spell he learned as an adolescent. It was the cause of some of the discord between the two—the lack of trust. Though Thor believed them to have mostly resolved it in the weeks aboard the _Statesman_ before Thanos’ attack. Still…

_You know how he is._

_Is._ Not _was._

_Is._

“So, he’s here?” He allowed the lightning to flow through him into the ground, evaporating the nearby Outriders. They didn’t even have the chance to scream. “Where?”

“I’m here.”

Thor froze at the sound of that familiar smooth voice behind him. Heimdall covered him as he turned around slowly to see _exactly_ what he expected. His brother was _right there._ As in _four-steps-away_ right there. He was wearing what he wore on the _Statesman,_ a simple blue leather tunic. His hair was frizzy (probably from all the static electricity in the air) and held back by a smaller version of his traditional helm. All the same, he was _here._

A burst of electricity (possibly enhanced by his raging thoughts) poured out of him, narrowly avoiding his allies, and incinerating the enemies in a wide radius. “Loki,” he breathed, unable to say more. Not a second of hesitation later, Loki was in his arms, complaining about “being crushed to death by his oaf of a brother”. His next words were something about Thor being hopeless without him, which was probably true, but the elder wasn’t really listening, clutching his shoulders tightly and refusing to let go.

Loki was _here. Alive._ That was all that mattered. It was _him,_ not some false copy that acted and sounded like him. He was _here._

“I’m sorry,” Thor muttered into his brother’s shoulder with tears welling in his eye. The leather was soft against his skin. He inhaled a trembling breath through his nose, taking in Loki, who smelled like he usually did despite the smoke in the air—saffron, herbs, and peppermint.

“Whatever for?” Loki asked, resting a hand on the back of his head.

Thor shuddered violently and pulled away to look Loki in the eye as he confessed, “I didn’t see it—in New York.” Another shudder. This time Loki blinked once and tilted his head slightly in confusion. “Steve said—with the Sceptre, I—he said you were trying to steal the Sceptre from Thanos and destroy the Chitauri,” he stumbled through the sentence, words pouring from his mouth out of order to match his jumbled thoughts. “And—”

“Stop it,” told Loki, resting a hand on his shoulder. “Your ignorance was necessary for the plan to work. The Chitauri—” he stopped in his explanation suddenly, eyes lighting up in an expression that Thor knew far too well. He had an idea—one of the good ones if they were lucky. Abruptly, he asked, “Brother, do you trust me?”

_What?_

_Of course!_

But a small voice in the back of his mind reminded him of a time when he _didn’t._

_That hope no longer exists to protect you. You betray me and I will kill you._

_I wish I could trust you._

_You still don't trust me, brother?_

_I guess I'll just have to go it alone. Like I've always done._

_Do you truly think so little of me?_

_Let's be honest, our paths diverged a long time ago._

_It's probably for the best that we never see one another again._

No.

_No._

Not for the best. _Definitely_ not.

Again, and again; over, and over; time after time, they always came back to the same question, sometimes unspoken and always worded differently, but still the same question: _do you trust me?_

“Yes.”

Loki _smiled._ Not one of the false ones he had reserved for those he didn’t like. Not one of the twisted ones flashed on Midgard during the invasion as he spat venom at any who crossed him. He _smiled,_ and Thor had a feeling that it was one of the first genuine ones in a long time.

“I need you to cover me for five minutes,” Loki requested with that same gleam in his eyes. Yep, he had an idea, and if Thanos was _lucky,_ he would live long enough to see whatever chaos Loki had planned for his forces.

“Loki, what—” Thor started, looking only to satisfy his curiosity. Sure, it would probably be more dramatic to allow whatever scheme Loki had planned to follow through, but still. What could be so important that it would take a total of _five minutes_ in a battle that moved as quickly as this?

“Five minutes,” Loki cut. “Cover me for _five minutes_ and I can make it worth it.” The clothes from the _Statesman_ were quickly changed into his Asgardian battle armour. His hair smoothed out, and Thor fought the urge to roll his eyes at his brother’s vanity.

He nodded anyway and stepped back, bringing Stormbreaker into his hand (when had he dropped it?). The Chitauri and Outriders around them were recovering from his previous lightning blast and had them surrounded on three sides.

Well then.

The Thunder God took out enemies in every direction with everything available. Thanos had taken everything from him five years ago, and he was not about to let it happen _again._ Loki remained where he was standing, muttering the words to a spell under his breath, and occasionally sending a knife in the direction of anything that managed to get past Thor’s rage, which was to say, _very little._ His fingertips were emitting a greenish mist, and his hands glowed with that same tinted shade.

For five minutes, Thor fended off the Chitauri, the Outriders, and Thanos’ other foot-soldiers. They were not difficult opponents in the slightest, but there were many of them. When Thor felt the first pang of fatigue in his right arm, that was when Loki decidedly finished and sprinted like hell in the direction of the centre of the battlefield.

“Loki!” Thor called out, alarmed at the fact that his brother had not even bothered to summon a weapon, opting instead to safeguard a small green orb of magical energy against his chest with both hands. Loki didn’t respond. A small hand motion conjured different footwear for himself, and… was Loki _flying?_

Seemingly stepping on nothing, Loki rose above the chaos of the battle, walking on steps only he could see. Or maybe he was making them as he went. Thor chased after him, Stormbreaker in one hand, a fistful of Lightning in the other. At the core of the fighting, Loki threw the orb into the air, waited for one exceptionally long second, then brought it crashing down to the earth as he was still suspended a good ten metres above the ground.

Thor idly wondered what the orb could be. Loki could cast amateur level spells without thinking about it and his illusions were second nature. He wondered what it was that would take him _five whole minutes._ A protection spell for all their allies? Perhaps something to destroy Thanos’ ship or a spell that would cloak everyone from his sight. Thor had seen similar spells in the past, though they did not take nearly this long. Whatever it was, Thanos was doomed.

He had half a second to marvel before the sphere shattered against the ground, and _every_ Chitauri foot-soldier, Gorilla, and Leviathan _detonated_ in plumes of green-blue fire. The battlefield _shook_ with the impact; shock waves rippling out from where the sphere first hit the ground threw Thor backwards a solid twenty meters. He was lying on his back, groaning. Yeah, he probably shouldn’t have stood right next to it.

Their allies were stunned, blown back in the explosions, but for the most part, unharmed by them. 

_“What the hell was that?”_ Steve asked through the comm system. He was breathless and gasping for air as he spoke.

 _“Fireworks?”_ Stark suggested. _“Strange, was that you?”_

“No,” Thor said loudly, wincing as he tried to sit up, and pressing a finger to his ear to speak into the small communication device. His head was throbbing. “That—that was my brother.” Speaking of whom, Loki was close to the blast’s origin; was he all right? It was _his_ spell—he had to be.

A volley of exclamations and thanks came through the system all at once and Thor could not keep track of the voices for the life of him. Half of them were unrecognizable and the other half were drowned out by the noise of battle. It was only then that he realized the explosions only applied to the Chitauri, but not the Outriders, so there was still a fight going on, but an easier one.

Why had only the Chitauri exploded, but not the other troops? Did that require too much power? Or was there some element of familiarity? Thor did not know, and he didn’t care to find out. Loki was right; it was worth it.

Thor got up slowly, muscles screaming at him, but he did. He trudged back to the epicentre of the spell and found Loki on the ground, sitting on a pile of rubble with blood running freely from his nose. The frontline had moved on, pushing forward steadily with the detrimental loss of the Chitauri. “You’re an idiot,” Thor said flatly, wrapping an arm underneath him to help him stand.

“I’m fine,” Loki firmly denied, but with the blood and his glazed eyes, the argument was not at all convincing. He leaned his weight onto Thor, trying to stand, then failing and sitting down again.

“Sure,” Thor drawled dryly, rolling his eyes. “You’re done.” He would not have Loki kill himself after _just_ coming back. He would _not_ allow it.

“No. I can still fight,” Loki objected vehemently, summoning a dagger into his right hand for emphasis, not unlike the toothpick he tried to kill Thanos with. The intricate blade was pointed right at Thor’s chin. “Don’t you _dare_ bench me.”

Thor’s lips thinned into a tight frown: “I will if I have to.” He pushed the blade of the dagger away from his face with an outstretched finger.

Loki lowered it and wiped the blood from his nose. “You may try,” he threatened before attempting to stand on his own, swaying slightly. Thor offered his hand, but Loki just shook his head and righted himself. “It’s been a while since I was able to cast like that. Don’t hover. I just need a minute.”

“If you’re admitting to needing a minute,” said Thor, matter-of-factly, “you probably need a lot more than just that.” 

“Shut up.” Loki’s fists clenched and glowed green for a few seconds while Thor dealt with several Outriders that had made it past the new front line. The heroes were quickly closing in on Thanos, but the Gauntlet was still an unknown quantity. Loki groaned softly, and his hands glowed brighter.

He was healing himself, Thor noted. “You’ll drain your magic, brother,” he cautioned softly, but the warning behind his words was clear: _don’t make me lose you again_.

“I won’t,” Loki growled, then winced, features tightening. “I’m not stupid.”

But he _would._ That was the problem. Loki was more than likely to drain himself throwing everything into this fight. Thor glared at him, watching the glow eventually fade away entirely.

 _“Cap!”_ shouted Clint through the comm. _“What do you want me to do with this damn thing?” The Gauntlet._ Clint had the Gauntlet. Thor’s stomach clenched.

Loki shot him a confused look; Thor was staring very intently at nothing. The elder pointed at his ear. Loki flicked his fingers and a similar-looking device appeared in his hand, which he quickly put on.

The Captain replied immediately, _“Get those Stones as far away as possible!”_

 _“No!”_ said another voice desperately. Banner. _“We need to get them back where they came from.”_

 _“No way to get them back.”_ That was Tony. _“Thanos destroyed the quantum tunnel.”_

_“Hold on! That wasn’t our only time machine.”_

Loki looked at him intensely with an expression mixed with frustration, confusion, and above all, reluctant acceptance. He flicked off the comm, then said to Thor, “Time travel.” A resigned sigh.

Thor opened his mouth to explain but was interrupted.

“No,” Loki stopped him harshly, but slightly playfully. Or maybe Thor was just seeing things. “You’re the idiot.”

The Thunderer smiled, taking in Loki’s half-bemused expression. “Well,” he replied gleefully, “You’ve always said so.”

They rejoined the fight a moment later, fighting side by side with the Avengers. Loki attacked with his daggers; Thor, with Stormbreaker and Lightning. Thor noted uneasily that Loki was being conservative with his magic; a result of the spell that destroyed the Chitauri. They fought side by side, combat patterns blending in a harmony that they had centuries to establish during their countless battles and quests. 

Thor lost track of how many Outriders had fallen by his hand. Stormbreaker was covered in blood and grime from Thanos’ armies. At some point, Loki had disappeared with a quick comment: “We can do more damage separately.” It wasn’t untrue. With Loki by his side, Thor had to be as careful not to shock him as he had to strike the enemies. He knew that Loki could defend himself if anything happened, but he still worried, nonetheless.

The Avengers on the comm system planned to get the Stones back to their correct times, and Thor listened intently as they made their way to a brown van in the middle of the field. A man whose accent Thor couldn’t recognize took the Gauntlet from Clint and made a break for the van, only to be interrupted by one of Thanos’ lieutenants. Wanda called, “I’ve got it,” and the Stones continued on their way. Moments later, the cannons on Thanos’ ship fired on the battlefield, taking out scores of both their troops and his. The Midgardian sorcerers shielded portions of their troops with sparking orange mandalas. Thor stayed beneath one of them, knowing that one of those blasts was probably enough to severely injure even him.

On the other side of the field, he noticed a recognizable green-gold shimmer that meant Loki was still alive over there, shielding their allies. The barrage of cannon-fire did not mean that the Outriders stopped coming. They seemed to hold no regard for their own lives—little more than animals killing themselves if it meant killing an enemy. He averted his gaze to where that green shield held, still glowing, meaning Loki was alive still.

It held. Lightning vaporized an Outrider, covering the ground in its gore. Stormbreaker sliced through two opponents before returning to his hand. It held. Electricity pulsed through the ground, taking out a swarm of Outriders closing in on the wizard holding the shield. The orange glow persisted. Thor looked over his shoulder, looking for the green glow.

It was no longer there.

* * *

Loki sensed it before he saw it—the witch’s power. It felt like the magic of the Sceptre but was not identical. No, this was something else. Her magic was overwhelming and wild, swallowing the battlefield in its intensity. The sensation of the Mind Stone was _not pleasant_ —to say the least—it was distracting, so he pulled away from it, choosing to battle on the outskirts rather than the centre where it was strongest.

Here, there were fewer Avengers to shoot him wary looks, even though he fought on their side. They, evidently, did not trust him; Loki did not expect them to do so. Why Thor trusted him was as well a slight mystery, as he was last seen giving the Tesseract to the Titan.

On the _Statesman,_ his magic had been depleted after fighting the Black Order. When he returned to the shores of what he assumed was New Asgard, choking and sputtering with memories of the Titan crushing his throat still omnipresent in his mind, it was replenished in its entirety. Odin’s bindings on his magic fell during his near-death on Svartálfheim, so Loki assumed the Other’s block on his magic (a much more oppressing one than the Allfather’s) lifted when he died on the ship. At first, it made no sense, why the Titan would take his greatest asset before sending him to Midgard. Later, he realized it was meant to make him more dependent on the Sceptre and be held over his head as a bargaining tool. Midgard for his magic. 

_Rot in Helheim._

Although his seiðr was back at full strength, the detonator spell had taken a lot out of him, draining at least half of his reserves during the casting of the spell, and another large portion during its execution. Loki had not expected the blast to throw him back into a small hill of smashed concrete blocks and had to spend another portion healing his cracked ribs. Thus, caution was needed to ration what remained of his seiðr, but it was returning steadily.

Loki was stabbing through a small pack of Outriders on the fringes of the battle when he noticed another magical aura in the vicinity—the Midgardian who had dropped him through a portal. Memories of falling swelled up, and he quickly shoved them down. Now was _not_ the time to be thinking about that. The mortal sorcerer was irritating and amateurish (perhaps with _one_ exception to that), but he _was_ on their side, and they would need everyone possible to defeat the Titan.

“Loki,” he said, pausing his battle for a moment to speak directly. “You aren’t supposed to be here.” There was a look on his face that he couldn’t quite interpret. Anxiety? Anger? Resignation? He was tense, that much was certain—it radiated into his posture and in the way that his magic flowed—strained and as stiff as the sorcerer was.

In return, Loki scowled at the second-rate. “Yes, I tend to do that,” he replied snidely, loosing a dagger in the direction of an Outrider to his right. A high-pitched shriek was enough to tell him that it had hit its mark.

He sighed dramatically. Loki nearly rolled his eyes. “Are you with us or against us?”

Loki gave him a withering look, eyes flickering between the purposefully ignorant magician and his own armour, which was practically _dripping_ with Outrider blood and gore. “I am with whichever side sees _him_ dead.”

The man’s lips turned down into something that wasn’t quite a frown. “I’m Doctor Strange,” he introduced himself. It was an odd name, and Loki could imagine others becoming confused, but Allspeak translated meaning behind words as well as their denotations, so there was no confusion on his part. Strange, however, seemed somewhat satisfied (and startled) that Loki _hadn’t_ questioned it. So that was amusing, at least.

“The portals,” Loki started, inwardly cursing himself for even asking, “Was that you? Alone?” He kept his voice carefully neutral; he did not want to exaggerate the sorcerer’s hubris further (if that was even possible). Loki was relatively sure that Midgardians used a token of some sort to assist them in creating their portals. All the same, holding that many over that distance had to require a great deal of focus.

Strange smiled thinly. “It was.”

The smug look on the mortal’s face was almost enough for him to back out of his acknowledgement. _Almost._ “Not bad,” he recognized indifferently. Without a shred of inborn seiðr in him, Strange would only ever master Midgardian magic, which took energy from the surrounding environment instead of from within. All the same, holding dozens of portals open at once _was_ impressive.

Loki turned sharply, sensing the Outrider behind him, and swiftly sent a knife through its throat. It fell, blood gushing from the fatal wound.

Strange lightly huffed, “The Chitauri—I take it you did that?”

The beasts deserved their gruesome deaths for what their master had done to him. It was _satisfying,_ watching them burn in the magic that they had bound. “I did,” Loki confirmed, a slight smirk creeping up his face.

“Not bad,” Strange replied, echoing Loki’s previous casual tone. He returned to the fight at hand a moment after, mandalas glowing radiantly in each hand.

Loki didn’t bother restraining himself from rolling his eyes and looked over his shoulder in the direction that he left his brother. A sudden flare of electricity was enough to tell him that Thor was managing well enough without him. He had been right. They _could_ do more damage separately when Thor was not holding back his lightning.

They were pushing forward; the Outriders were struggling without air support from the Chitauri Leviathans and skiffs. Naturally, that was when everything descended into chaos. _Sanctuary_ opened its plasma cannons on the battlefield, incinerating both their allies and the Outriders. 

Loki threw up a shield around himself and the sorcerers that were fighting nearby, who summoned their mandalas as well. Some shattered, most held. He winced as one of the blasts struck his shield, and poured more seiðr into the spell. 

_“Uh,” said an unfamiliar woman over the comm system. “Is anyone else seeing this?”_

Loki looked around for the source of what she was referring to. His eyes settled on the free-flowing water that was spurling from a break in a dam in the lake. That water would wipe out the battlefield, giving the Titan the advantage as his troops didn’t care whether they lived or died.

Strange ran towards it, the Cloak of Levitation billowing behind him. He quickly collected the water into a cyclone, which twisted above the broken dam. It wasn’t efficient, holding that much water at once. Loki briefly thought of several ways in which that problem could be solved, one of which was currently resting in his magical cache. 

_Dammit._

He left the shielding to the Midgardians, who managed to maintain their mandalas, and ran up to Strange. “Go,” he ordered flatly. “I’ve got this.”

The mortal nodded once before the Cloak took him back to the battle.

The cyclone dissipated as soon as he left. Water poured down from the lake and the sky. Loki had a moment to regret his decision before he brought forth the second item he had stolen from the Vault before summoning Surtur—the Casket. He had hesitated to take it from the Vault—though it was his birthright, he supposed—and never intended to look at it. There were a few other items in his cache that he had taken, but those were irrelevant at the current moment.

_The Casket._

That meant shifting forms.

The cold metal handles grew colder as he held them, waiting for the dreaded change.

 _It doesn’t matter,_ a voice inside reminded harshly. _Defeating the Titan is the only thing of importance._

_Do it._

Loki could feel the chill creeping up his arms, over his shoulders, chest, face. It didn’t feel _wrong,_ but it didn’t feel _right_ either—forced change was never welcomed. He opened the Casket on the cascade before him. The icy magic flowed through him; the Casket’s song drowned out all else save the thrum of foreign but soothing magic in his veins. It froze the water easily, creating a thick barrier that blocked the rest of it, making a new dam of solid ice. Sunlight through the smoke struck the crystallized liquid, painting the ground with small glints of light and colour.

Loki returned the box to his dimensional pocket, examining the wall for any cracks or weak points. There were none. He was about to return to the battle when a shock wave resounded from _somewhere,_ shattering the ice to shards. Loki groaned in mild annoyance as the water fell again. He brought out the Casket _again,_ and froze the water, doubling its strength and quickly spelling it with durability. The transformation had not even fully taken place before it was done, and he returned the Casket to its place, leaving only the remnants of chilled air in its wake.

The battlefield had been torn to shreds by the cannons, which must have stopped firing at some point. Loki hadn’t been paying them much attention.

He turned around, looking once again for Thor, who should have been more than able to keep himself alive for that short of a time. Only… there was no hint of electricity on the battlefield.

Then there was another blast of energy, different from the one that had shattered the ice, and similar to the one that Loki had felt faintly when—oh _Norns_ —when he had been returned to life. Someone had snapped with the Gauntlet. There were two people on this planet that could survive that amount of energy: the Titan and Thor. Neither option appealed to him, knowing the damage it would do to his brother. It may even _kill_ him.

Loki ran towards the epicentre of the blast, desperately calling out his brother’s name. If that idiot had gotten himself killed... Loki did not want to think about it. 

An Outrider charged at him from behind, then disintegrated into ash before he could land a hit. Its remains blew away in the gentle breeze.

Oh.

_Oh._

So, the Titan had not snapped. Meaning... “Thor!” he yelled frantically, looking around. All around, the Titan’s armies turned to dust that blew away with the wind. Where _was_ he?

Loki reached the blast’s origin point and released a long exhale when he saw Thor there, still standing, and thankfully _not_ holding the Gauntlet. He looked weary, but _weary_ was far preferred to _dead._

_Thank the Norns._

It was a human who was holding it instead, surrounded by a small group of others that Loki didn’t recognize. _Stark._ He did this. Stark gave his life to defeat the Titan. It was admirable— _honourable_ —that he did so. It was not the sort of thing he would have expected from a mortal. 

Thor was still there, watching as Stark’s loved ones said their last goodbyes, from his place behind the Captain. He was bruised, bloody, covered in a thin layer of dirt and dust, but _alive._ That was all that really mattered.

Feeling more than slightly out of place, Loki backed away from the heroes, tucking himself out of sight behind a mound of rubble. The heroes should be given time to grieve without him there. Loki was still not entirely sure they would not attempt to kill him on sight. He sat down on a block of concrete and closed his eyes. All his muscles were aching and his seiðr was depleted from overuse—nothing he had not suffered before, but unpleasant, nonetheless.

Loki let out a long sigh. They had won. At a great cost, but they _won._ Both he and Thor survived, which was more than he had originally hoped for. He relaxed, leaning against another block of concrete behind him, ignoring the stiffness of the seat, and watched the sunlight filter through the smoke and smog. Thor would, eventually, find him waiting here. 

He always did.

**Author's Note:**

> Technically, I guess there are three people who could survive the Gauntlet: Thanos, Thor, and Bruce. But Loki doesn’t know Bruce and the Hulk merged, so he automatically assumes it’s Thanos or Thor. 
> 
> I had a ton of scenes that I inserted, removed, reinserted, then removed again. I think the original draft of this had a Loki vs. Ebony Maw scene, as well as Loki and Nebula. In this version, the only Agent of Asgard reference was the Seven-League Boots, but there used to be more references to the comics and Norse mythology. Rant over.
> 
> Thanks for reading! The next piece comes out next Friday. It's kind of an epilogue, but kind of not because it's around the same length as everything else so far and possibly longer. I'm not quite sure yet.
> 
> Side note: I’m pretty new here and still getting to know the system, so if you have any tips for tagging, formatting, or anything else, I’d really appreciate it. Thanks!


End file.
